Ann Coffey

Monthly Archives: February 2013

June 19th 2013

Two senior Manchester MPs have stepped up the campaign to prevent vulnerable young people in foster care being forced to leave home at the age of 17.

Ann Coffey, MP for Stockport and Paul Goggins, MP for Wythenshawe and Sale East – who both have backgrounds working with troubled young people as social workers before they entered Parliament – said the situation was “crazy”.

The average age for leaving home for children in the UK is 24 and yet every year hundreds of the most vulnerable children in the country are forced to leave foster care before they are 18.

Many of those young people are not ready to make their own way in the world and become homeless, or get involved in drink and drugs, suffer depression and can become targets for sexual groomers and predators, if they leave care too early. Continue Reading Article

15th October 2013

Ann Coffey MP has called for a change in the law to make using racist abuse in a house or flat an offence after a Greater Manchester police officer was called a “nigger”.

Currently, under Section 4A of the Public Order Act 1986, no offence is committed if “harassment, alarm or distress” takes place inside a dwelling.

Ms Coffey has tabled an amendment to the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill, to be debated today, to make it an offence to use racist or other abusive insults against a police officer who is present in the dwelling in the execution of his or her duty.

I have always been a strong supporter of apprenticeships and was delighted to meet Bradley Southworth, aged 19, who is four months into a 12 months apprenticeship position with Barclays bank in Stockport. Bradley told me that he that he enjoys every working day and that the apprenticeship has given him an opportunity he never thought he would get to build a career.

Barclays are encouraging local Stockport schools to register with their lifeskills programme http://www.barclayslifeskills.com/ which offers short training sessions in the bank and links to work experience positions.